Run
by Grav
Summary: Teyla runs.


**AN**: Written for the Teyla Thing-a-thon at **teylafen**, for **sabaceanbabe**, who wanted "gen or het; if shippy, Teyla/Ronon or Teyla/Lorne, if not shippy, anything with Ronon, Elizabeth, John, Rodney, Lorne, Keller, Carson, Zelenka, Ford, Grodin, Heightmeyer, Halling..." and "Teyla kicking ass and taking names; sparring, both physically and verbally, with any of the above named characters; a quiet night at home". Thank goodness I don't thrive on specifics. ;)

**Spoilers**: Up to the end of the series, more or less.

**Disclaimer**: So not mine!

**Rating**: Teen

**Character**: Teyla (and kind of a lot of other people…)

**Summary**: Teyla runs.

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><p><strong>Run<strong>

Teyla runs.

_There's a story Elizabeth had told her once, back in the early days of the expedition when both women were new to their authority and tentative in their uses of it. Teyla had asked how Elizabeth always knew what to say, how to act, in the face of unfamiliar circumstances. It wasn't that Teyla was uncomfortable at Atlantis, it was just that so many things were different, and she knew all too well that one cultural misstep could foul a trading partnership for years. She did not want to make any mistakes. Elizabeth had all but told her that she would, but not to worry because everyone else would too. And then she told the story of the lion and the gazelle._

There are Wraith everywhere in the woods, and John and the others do not understand the danger. Their world was untouched by the Wraith, something Teyla is still struggling to comprehend. How could there be any place the Wraith could not reach? How could there be any star they didn't darken, any planet they did not desecrate, any Ring they did not traverse? Teyla watches the newcomers fire at the ships, unmoving and static on the ground, ignorant of what that stillness could lead too. When the whining noises start and the beams appeared, Teyla could see them figure it out, but by then it is too late. That doesn't stop them from trying to run.

_Every morning, in an Earth-place called Africa, the orange sunrise breaks across the savannah, bringing light to grasses and stubby trees. The night animals doze and the day animals prepare for a race. When the gazelle wakes up, she knows she must run faster than the fastest lion, or she will be eaten. So she runs._

The pace of Atlantis, after those first few frantic weeks, is mindboggling slow. The scientists wake, meander into the mess and linger over their carefully rationed coffee. The military troops are more regimented, but this far from their generals and commanders, there is a casual laxity to their mandated schedule. Teyla, who is accustomed to a far more immediate life, feels like she is walking in a river against the current, pushing faster and receiving no more movement for all her effort. Carson explains that this is because the days here are longer than the Earth people are used to. They will adjust, but the mornings and the evenings are slow. Eventually, Teyla works her way into both schedules. She talks with the scientists, learning things she cannot fully understand and stirring coffee until she forgets that she doesn't really like the taste, and every morning she dresses carefully to meet with the marines for stick training. Time begins to run again.

_Every morning, in that same Earth-place called Africa, where that same orange sunlight casts fire on the same grasses and stubby trees. As the night animals bed down and the gazelle takes stock of the day, another animal prepares for the race. When the lioness wakes up, she knows that she must run faster than the slowest gazelle, or she and her cubs will starve to death. So she runs._

Elizabeth dies, or doesn't, and the world changes. It's a new ocean and a new land to settle, both alien and yet familiar so long as Teyla doesn't look at them too closely. This is how things are done. The Wraith drive you out and you build in another spot. Halling still prays to the Ancestors, even now that he has seen what they can and cannot do. Teyla saves her prayers for now, waiting for a time when they will not turn to ashes in her mouth. She buried Charrin by that tradition, the tradition of the Ancestors, and it galls her to think that it might have played them false. Without Elizabeth, many things are different, and Teyla turns back to the traditions of her people in the hope that she will find peace there. She finds peace and companionship, and then something more. When she feels the child stir within her, she resolves that she is finished with being the gazelle. Teyla will raise her child in whichever tradition she chooses. She will teach it to run for other reasons, and it will not fear the chase.

_So the moral of the story, the lesson that should be learned, is that in that Earth-place called Africa, it doesn't matter if you are the lioness or if you are the gazelle. All that matters is that when the sun comes up – when the fire is lit and the day begun anew – when the sun comes up, you had better be running._

When she stands on the outside of the tower, the wind in her hair and the choice before her, Teyla does not hesitate. The hands of a Wraith are the source of their power, what inspires fear of them. John has told her of vampires, of teeth and blood, but when Teyla things of _feeding_, she thinks of hands. Michael's hands had been Wraith and human, had held a fork and been held against the chest of his victims as the life left them and they turned to shrivelled husks. All Teyla sees now is his fingers, as thin and frail as twigs, stripped from a tree and left without the protection of the stronger boughs. Her boots are military issue, all the way from Earth, and their soles are thick. She lifts one, and brings it down as hard as she can. She is done running.

_It is not so different here, in the place the Earth-people call the Pegasus Galaxy. We do not have lionesses and we do not have gazelles, but we have bright suns and tall grasses and stubby trees. We have the Wraith and we have the Asurans, and we have the Hoffans and the Satedans, and we have the Lanteans and the Genii, who do not play by the normal rules. But none of that matters, in that first light of morning. Only one thing is true. When the sun comes up, it doesn't matter if you are the lion or the gazelle. When the sun comes up, you had better be running._

As his mother taught him, Torren runs.

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><p><strong>finis<strong>

Gravity_Not_Included, August 13, 2011


End file.
